O dearest blank of mine
by The Mage of Doom
Summary: Rhys finds a word puzzle book for Soren and he's more than glad to fill it out. RHYSxSOREN!


So I was reading a story called Yaoi Emblem: Path of Raunchiness by FlamingDoritos (highly recommend you go read it) and in it there was a little itty bitty love for SorenxRhys...Or RhysxSoren... Don't ask me who would top cause I sure as hell don't know. .__. In fact there's no sex in this fic so if that's a let down feel free to hit the back button on your browser. Anyhoozle, after reading certain parts in Yaoi Emblem my brain spawned **this **idea. Soooo please enjoy it. ^^

Disclaimer: I OWN NOTHING.

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It was a quiet afternoon and the mercenaries were spending the day relaxing as they didn't have any bandits to take care of or villages to save or even an orphaned princess to save. Everyone was off doing their own thing; Ike was sparring with Boyd and Mia, Shinon and Gatrie were off drinking, Titania was helping Mist with the laundry as was Rolf, Oscar was in the mess hall getting lunch ready, Rhys was just returning from a trip into town, and lastly Soren was cooped up in his room reading one of his many tomes. Overall a normal non-working day for the Greil Mercenaries.

All activities were then put to a halt when Oscar called everyone for lunch. Everyone made their way to the mess hall...Well everyone except Soren. The small mage had heard Oscar call everyone to lunch but he decided at the moment he'd rather stay in his room and read than go and spend a good half-hour in the presence of people he didn't particularly enjoy being around, save for Ike. When Rhys saw, or hadn't seen, Soren come into the mess hall he felt it his duty to go pry the teen away from whatever he was doing and get him to come eat, because goddess that child was so thin he may as well be a twig. So he headed off to Soren's room and knocked on the door when he got there.

"..Come in." Soren granted Rhys permission to enter the room.

Rhys opened the door to the room and poked his head inside, "Soren you should come eat something." He said.

"I'll eat later, I'm not hungry right now." Was Soren's response.

Rhys sighed, "You say that but we both know that you won't do that..."

This time Soren sighed, he did have a habit of saying that. Most of the time people just took it as he wanted to be left alone, but Rhys always seemed to be the one who ignored that. Him and Ike that is.... "_Perhaps their working together on this... _" Thought Soren, then he said aloud, "True as that may be it doesn't change the fact I want to be left alone right now. So please leave me alone." And with that Soren went back to reading his book, paying no more attention to Rhys.

Rhys could see he wasn't going to change Soren's mind on this (The teen could be as stubborn, if not _more _stubborn than a mule) so he just shook his head, "Alright fine but I'll be back later with some food for you. And you **will **eat it, even if I have to get Ike to hold you down and shove it down your throat."

The only sign that Rhys got that Soren had heard him was a small amused smile that briefly passed over the mage's face. After that Rhys closed the door and went back to the mess hall to eat lunch.

--

About an hour and a half later Rhys kept true to his word and brought Soren food, and to prove he was serious about getting Soren to eat, Rhys had brought Ike with him to ensure Soren ate the food. Soren wasn't pleased about it but he knew that with both Rhys and Ike here he wasn't going to get out of eating the food. So he reluctantly ate as the other two watched.

"I have to say I'm not comfortable eating with you two watching me like that..." Soren said.

"We're making sure you actually eat the food and don't shove it someplace, pretending you ate it." Rhys replied.

"...That would be a waste of food which in turn is a waste of money. Ontop of that only five year olds who don't want to eat their vegetables do that...." Soren gave Ike a look.

"Oh for the love of... It was ONE time!" Ike said in his defense.

"Regardless, we're watching you until you finish eating." Rhys said before Soren could make a comeback to that.

Soren, made a face and turned to his food, turning his back to the other two a little so he didn't have to look at them as he ate. Once Soren finished the food, Ike and Rhys left, Rhys taking the dishes to the kitchen for cleaning. Afterwards he came back to Soren's room, only this time he had a small book in his hand.

"Soren" Rhys said opening the door, accidentally forgetting to knock, "I wanted to give you something."

Soren had his back turned to the door and he didn't bother looking at Rhys, "If it's another plate of whatever the hell you had Mist make me, I don't want it." He said.

Rhys gave a small laugh, "It's not anymore of Mist's cooking. On the contrary, I brought you a book."

This piqued Soren's interest and he turned to face the other man, "What kind of book?" He asked curiously.

"It's a book filled with little word games and such. While I was out in town today I saw it and I thought you might like it...So...I got it for you." Rhys hel the book out to Soren.

"Oh...Thank you." Soren took the book and looked at it, "Though I don't see why you would get me anything..."

"Eh? Oh! Uh... Well you see..." Poor Rhys started to blush a little and didn't know what to say because the reason he had gotten Soren the book was because he had a crush on him and he wanted to give the mage things he loved. Hence the book full of word puzzles....But Soren would think he was weird if he said that, even Rhys thought it was weird and he's the one thinking it, "I uh....I just thought you might like it...? So I guess I thought I'd do something nice and get it for you...?"

"I see... Well again thank you..." Soren placed the book on his desk and then went back to what he was doing, "Was that all you needed?"

"Hm? Oh, uh yes... That was it.." And Rhys quickly left, realizing and mentally beating himself up for how stupid his response must have sounded. Oh well, no use crying over spilt milk as they say.

--

Once Rhys was gone and his door was closed, Soren allowed himself to smile and laugh a little at what just happened. He knew very well why Rhys had gotten him the book and seeing him get flustered so cutely like that was amusing to the mage. He knew Rhys' feelings for him, he had known for a long time. The reason he hasn't said anything about it is 1) it's amusing to see Rhys get flustered over little things like this and 2) He himself was far too embarrassed and afraid to admit he too had feelings for other.

Soren picked up the book Rhys had gotten him and he ran a hand over the cover of it. He opened it up and looked over some of the little word puzzles in it, and one towards the middle of the book caught his eye. He stared at it for a while. It was an adlib puzzle and the two sentences and blanks got the gears in Soren's head turning. He smirked, picked up his quill and set to work on the puzzle.

--

After talking with Soren, Rhys had immediatly left for his room and gone to bed. The next morning he was rather suprised to see the book he had given Soren sitting on his bedside table. Had he not liked it? Was something wrong with it? Rhys began to question why the book was there, then something caught his attention. A bookmark was sticking out of the pages of the book. Rhys sat up and grabbed the book, opening to the marked page and his eyes widened a little when he read the page over. There, written in Soren's perfectly neat hand writting, an adlib puzzle was filled out.

O, dearest priest of mine, how your presence makes me swoon.  
To show my feelings I give a kiss from me to you.

Rhys could help but stare at the word choices. Did this mean...? He read a little further down the page and there, scribbled at the edge, again was Soren's writting. It said: "From one who loves you very much, come see me later, I want to.....'Talk' to you."

Rhys smiled and couldn't wait to go 'talk' to Soren.

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A/N: And that is that. Not my best work and I'm not sure I got the pacing of the story right... But overall I'm glad with what I did. Especially since I'm doing this at midnight and I can barely keep my eyes open. XD -ahem- Anyways, reviews would be awesome! See you all in my next story! ^^


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